Lateral with Tom Scott - 199: Unburned gasoline

Episode Date: July 31, 2026

VT Physics, VeeVee and Geoff Marshall face questions about banned building blocks, rampant rhinos and software steps. LATERAL is a comedy panel game podcast about weird questions with wonderful answers, hosted by Tom Scott. For business enquiries, contestant appearances or question submissions, visit https://lateralcast.com. HOST: Tom Scott. QUESTION PRODUCER: David Bodycombe. EDITED BY: Julie Hassett at The Podcast Studios, Dublin. MUSIC: Karl-Ola Kjellholm ('Private Detective'/'Agrumes', courtesy of epidemicsound.com). ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS: David Turner, Danny, Ron Nelson, Ryan, Mira S., Simon, Anton. FORMAT: Pad 26 Limited/Labyrinth Games Ltd. EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: David Bodycombe and Tom Scott. © Pad 26 Limited (https://www.pad26.com) / Labyrinth Games Ltd. 2026. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Now streaming on Disney Plus, the Hulu original series Furious follows FBI agent Alice Black, played by Emmy Rossum, on the hunt for a mysterious and calculating serial killer. Both walk their own paths toward justice, and as their lives start to intertwine, the line between right and wrong begins to blur. New episodes week over week. Watch the Hulu original series Furious, now streaming only on Hulu on Disney Plus. Why is Dick Van Dyke not allowed to play with Lego? The answer to that at the end of the show. My name's Tom Scott, and this is Lateral. Welcome back to Lateral.

A couple of days ago, our producer accidentally ticked a button, and the podcast has been upgraded to include achievements. So far, today's guests have already unlocked, arrived on time, made eye contact with camera, and pretended they totally knew what this show was before arriving, which is probably for the best, because they are all returning players. Later on, someone will earn confidently incorrect. It's probably going to be me.

And if we're lucky, we may see the legendary wild guest combo, hoping to achieve temporary immunity from follow-up questions. First of all, welcome back to the show, Jeff Marshall. Hello, Tom. How are you? It's so rare that someone asks. And it's also so rare that someone asks in such a downbeat tone that I assume there's something wrong with me. How are you? I care. There we go.

I'm doing okay, John. How's things with you? What have you been working on lately? More and more long-form documentary-style transport videos. So I'm up to... I'm a big, big edit. It's all over the place on my YouTube channel, but it's all happening. You really are going in for long-form stuff rather than just five minutes to go to the new train station. Yeah, I used to do five minutes at a new train station. Now I'm doing 20, 25, 30-minute, deep behind the scenes looking at places. That's my new thing. Yeah. We've both made that change, haven't we? Now that I'm, you know, well, by the time this goes out, hopefully I should be posting new stuff online, we've both gone long form, which does put us

in somewhat conflict with most of the videos that our other two players put out. Firstly, from VVTV, VV, welcome back to the show. Hi, hi, Tom, hi everyone. I'm VVVTVee. I create short-form content just on kind of daily news, happenings around the world. I kind of call it defrosting my journalism degree, one real at a time. There is so much news. How? How? How? How? I know. Honestly, I really just look at things that interest me. So a lot of the times my viewers will realize that following me on my Instagram,

we're watching my YouTube shorts. It's kind of just a collection of things that I'm interested in the most. It's not necessarily the top story. It's the top story that will work for you and the words. Correct. Correct. Well, good luck on the show today. The third member of our team, is returning and is also VV's older sister. Welcome back to the show from VT Physics, VT Physics. Hello, Tom. It's great to be back. Thanks for having me on the show again. I didn't realize until just before we went on air that you said you were a physics teacher.

That's also your job. Yes. Is it easier to deal with secondary school kids or YouTube commenters? With YouTube commenters, I can't delete them, whereas I can't delete my pupils. Oh yeah, that's an easy answer to the question. In high That's... Sometimes these questions tee up a long philosophical discussion. Sometimes, no, the kids are hard to deal with. That's fair.

Well, good luck to all three of you on the show today. Time to buff your microphones and check your inventories as we grind for the achievements hidden inside question one. Thank you to Mira S for this question. In 2025, how did Axolotel cause a problem for the Bank of Mexico worth $150 million US dollars? I'll say that again. In 2025, how did an axolottle cause a problem for the Bank of Mexico worth 150 million US dollars?

Is that a top of fish? Is that what that is? I'm thinking to something else. I don't know what that word is. What's that word? An axolotl. A-X-O-O-T-L-L. I'm hoping one of the panel knows what that is.

So this must be that how I'm going to go with, on my head, there's some kind of security feature on the notes of the Bank of Mexico. and an axolotle or whatever it is, is somehow the image of that was somehow involved in one of the security images on the backnotes. Tom's face is like, you've got it, Jeff. And I was completely just going off top of my head there. You've certainly got some parts of this.

An axolotle, I had to just Google what an axelottle was just to double check. Is it a fish? It's technically a mole salamander. Right. But if you define fish as thing in the water that swims around a bit, yeah, it's a fish. Like, by the definition of, it's close enough, yeah. Fish.

My friend Chris, YouTube, actually has one and featured that in one of his videos, and that's the only reason I somehow knew what that was. Okay, okay. So, yes, that's right. And where did you get banknotes from, Jeff? Because that is the right area for this. Because that's, I just met, you said Bank of Mexico? I did.

Right. So, I don't know. What the banks do, they make currency, right? Well, as well as, you know, save it for you. Who wouldn't fish it out? I don't know. Just that's where my mind went. Well, you're right that the Bank of Mexico is like the Bank of England or the Federal Reserve. It's not just some bank somewhere. It is the National Bank. So I'm guessing they produce banknotes, national banknotes. Yes. And perhaps they use a chemical or a substance that's released. by, is it axolato? Do you say, is that how you pronounce it? Axolato. Axolotl.

Also, thank you, producer David, who has, he said, please make sure you say that it's an amphibian, not a fish. Otherwise, he will have to deal with so many emails. That's fair. It's an amphibian. Hey, Tom, I hear that's a kind of amphibian. Is that, is that really, is that, is that, is that, oh. See, I still care. I care.

Wow. Sorry, VT was going with a chemical that the amphibian could produce. Releases or it could be, yeah, to produce banknotes. And if they don't have enough of them, they cannot produce more bagnotes. Or I'm also thinking along the lines of like, you know, to Axolotl's change color? Are they, like, I don't remember if this is like the wrong fact, but like, are they one of the types of, amphibians that change colour? I'll be honest.

You all are asking many questions about the biology of amphibians that are not on my notes. Yes, they do, shifting lighter or darker, but they don't do a full chameleon change, apparently. When I mentioned security features on a banknote earlier, Tom, I can't remember whether your face reacted in a,

ooh, correct, or an, kind of way. Because now I'm thinking, when you move a banknote in the light, you see different features of that things that are pretty... Hang on, is the axe a lot of like a national animal of Mexico or something? And none of us know that. It's not... It's from the area.

It's not like national animal. There have been a lot of things thrown out. Some of them actually quite close. So, VT, when you talked about a banknote shortage, yeah, to some extent. And Jeff, when you talked about it being a security feature, that's not right, but it was on the notes. There's a picture of the axolotto on Mexican banknotes.

Yes, axolotl. Sorry, the amphibian. Not a fish. Wow. Is it because the country or Mexico in general, they love this amphibian, and they want to collect this banknotes and they all rush to the bank and ask for one? Yes. Yes, that's close enough.

The axolottle is incredibly cute as amphibians go. And so there was a new 50 peso note, released in 2021 by the Bank of Mexico. It was so popular that 13 million Mexicans were deliberately avoiding spending it. It's worth about $3. So that is about $150 million U.S. dollars of bank notes that are just stashed away because the creature on them is cute. I need to look up what it looks like. I know. I'm so tempted to look it up right now.

The axolotl in question is called Gorda. It lives in Axelotitlan, which is a museum in Mexico City dedicated to axolotles. They have a whole museum dedicated to. They have a whole museum of axolotles. Jeff, whenever you're ready. Okay, this question has been sent in by Ryan from Queensland. Thank you. In Melbourne, Australia, a public awareness.

awareness campaign featured the slogan, Beware the Rhino and various imagery of rhinos on skateboards. But what was the campaign about? Again, in Melbourne, Australia, a public awareness campaign featured the slogan, Beware the Rhino with imagery of rhinos on skateboards. What was the campaign about? I am desperately trying to find an acronym for Rhino. The really horrible...

Ingenious North Ocelot. I'm not good at acronyms, carry on. Tom, you're really horrible at... No, no, no, no, sorry. What immediately comes to mind is that this has nothing to do with rhinos, but rather it's representing something? Correct, VT. It's nothing to do with rhinos.

But to do with skateboards? Well, it's had imagery of skateboards, so it could be... Yeah, I'll give you all my idea, the wheels on the skateboards are an illusion to some. something, but it's not specifically... An allusion, not an illusion, right? A illusion, yes. Checking my notes here.

Sorry. Is the rhino... Was it actually pictures of rhinos? Or was it like... Like a silhouetted picture of a rhino on a silhouetted picture of a skateboard? I'm trying to draw out a rhino on a skateboard to see of like the silhouette of the two things.

It looks cool. It looks cool. It looks cool. It looks like... I'm not going to show this to the camera because it's embarrassingly bad, but it looks rather like a seal coming out of a hole in an ice

and waving at you. It's kind of the silhouette that I've got here instead of rhino on a skateboard. Wait, have you all drawn pictures of rhinos on skateboards? We've all drawn pictures of rhinos and skaters on skateboards. I've not gone as far as drawing it. And I recognise that there are video options

for this podcast, but this bad drawing of a rhino on a skateboard is never seeing the line. Are we want to... Absolutely not. Is somebody going to be kind enough anyone to show me their picture of a right... Go on, Fini. That's it.

All right. YouTube, what is it? I would describe that as a cartoon character from the 1950s. He's got two little legs. That's great. I'm thinking like in... I remember in Melbourne, Australia, they have trams. So I'm thinking of it's like a...

Ooh. Go on. Could it be like a, like, yeah, like an allusion to trams because they're like big and clunky and they're quite noisy. Yeah. On wheels. I think you've nailed it. How did you?

What? All I was going to say it was tram tracks. I was going to say it was something to do with like, because cyclists have that all the time where they're trying to turn over tram tracks. They get knocked off by the fact that they're suddenly glided. along this gap, but is it, I'm wrong, it's just, VV's just saying, it's the trams. Oh, you've got it. You've been to Melbourne, obviously.

Have you been on the trams in Melbourne? That would help. No, I don't actually think I've been on the Melbourne trams, but I've definitely seen them. Okay. Do we need to work out why they described a tram as a rhino? No, I think, I think you're there. I'm just going to go with it. It was a campaign, yeah, like a safety campaign.

The campaign was reminding pedestrians and drivers. to keep safe near Melbourne's tram networks, which has tracks running around the city. And the campaign reminds people that colliding with a tram is the same force as being hit by 30 rhinos on skateboards. I thought the rhino was represented like a pedestrian or a skateboarder.

It's not, it's literally the tram. Yeah. But I like the fact that someone's done the maths and they've worked out that like a four-car tram is the same as... Rhinos. What animal should we choose? And then draw it.

Not like babies drunk. It was a safety campaign. Think rhinos on skateboards. Think trans, obviously. Hey, y'all's Kelly Clarkson with Wayfair. Ever order furniture online and wonder what if? Like, what if it doesn't hold up? That sofa was four days old.

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Elevate your savings with the Scotia high-interest savings account. Always earn high regular interest rates that grow the more you save and invest. Conditions apply. Visit scotiabank.com slash h-I-SA to learn more. Scotia Bank. You're richer than you think. Thank you to Simon for this question. Right before launch, a software project manager,

ticks two items off the checklist. I-18N and A-11Y. What do they represent? I'll give you that one more time. Right before launch, a software project manager ticks two items of the checklist. I-18-N and A-11-Y. What do they represent? B-V, V-T, I got nothing. I got nothing. You did say it's a software manager? Yes. Before launching something. But we don't know. what he's launching. It could be a campaign. It could be a software that he's just launching on his laptop? Oh, this is launching the software project, the new thing to the world. Oh, project. Okay. Launching a software project. Like a software, like a new software, because it's a software

project manager. Oh, yeah, no, I see how that can be read multiple ways. No, this is the manager of a software project. I-18N. I mean, I'm looking at my keyboard right now and just seeing like, if it's like anything that you check, I-18N and then A-11Y, but it doesn't seem like there's any pattern there.

And it's two items on a checklist rather than something that he's typing into. Yeah. If it was pure letters, I'd assume that it was an acronym for something, but there's numbers in there, unless it is still part acronym. You've, you get, I never,

You give me that poker face, Tom. I never know. You're correct. You're wrong. Which is it? Because this is a terrible show, Jeff. If people just ask me questions and I say, no, no, yes, no. I'm hoping you might talk about that.

I'm hoping someone might pick up Jeff's acronym thing and run with it. BV, VT, I think it's an acronym thing with numbers. What do we think? Yeah, or like maybe Tom's throwing us off by saying 18. So maybe it's like I-18N. could that be like, or A11. Y? I'm just thinking if it's... Wait, is it a phonetic thing? Is it actually spelling out another word? Again, I'm not looking at Tom's poker face. I'm looking at everyone else. It could be phonetics. Oh, okay. Like,

I... It's like an in-joke within the software house. Those four characters spell out an actual proper sentence, but they were bored of writing that sentence. So they abbreviated it down to four characters that just sounded like that thing. Wow. I'm homing in on this quite nicely. I think you're right, Jeff, it's not an acronym, but it's certainly something like that. So it sounds like something when you read it out loud. No, not in this case.

I don't think you'd want to read these out loud. Does it look like something? Does it look like another word that those words spell like backwards or upside down or mirror writing? I just feel like, I know a lot of software developers. They like to put in a little few Easter eggs. because I feel like it's an in-joke on the part of the software developers. It's more of an industry term, I'd say.

Could it be something like the 18th letter of the alphabet and then the 11th letter of the alphabet, but actually they needed to get, because of like, software engineering quirks, you had to have four characters? Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure those would be Irin and Acky. Which, not quite. I'm just looking at A11Y. It kind of spells out Ali.

Or does that not have anything to do with how we're looking at it? I was thinking about it, the 18. The 18, I'm 18. It also sounds like names you've given droids out of Star Wars. Sorry, my brain just went there for some reason. I guess maybe we can think along the lines of like it's right before launch. So it's like a final check. what would they do at like a final check?

Yeah, that's true. Particularly for I-18N, this isn't something you can do early in the process. You should do it like middle of the process. Far too many projects do this right at the end. But yeah, you can't do that one early on. Make a backup. Have a think what else those numbers could represent. Because you're right, it's a special kind of abbreviation.

But we're not looking for 18th letter of the alphabet. We're not looking for a sound-like or a look-alike. Are those characters universal? It works in multiple languages. Oh, oh, Jeff. No, but that's what I-18N is all about. What did I just say? You said about things working in multiple languages.

That is exactly what I-18N is all about. So it will not work in multiple languages, do you say? Or it will. It's about making it work in multiple languages. It has to work in all languages, not to say just English, but other... And that's the box you tick to say, yes, it works in... Yeah, works in multiple languages.

I-18N. But what does it stand for? What does it mean? What's that 18? Could it just be like 18 other letters that's in between? Yes. Oh, I... Oh, like, I...

Yeah, this is abbreviating a 20. letter word. What? Oh, good. Right, so now we're doing a crossword. Okay, great. I mean,

you've basically got it. These are called numeronyms, or possibly numeronyms. It's one of those words which has been created by people who wrote it down, so there is no official pronunciation for this.

So I-18N is I, 18 letters that have been abbreviated, and an N. Is it international something? International... Iization? Internationalisation. Yes. Correct. And while it should be done in the middle, far too often it happens just at the end when they just send it off to be translated. Wait, so what's the other one? A11Y. Oh. This is again about making it work for more people.

Accessibility. Accessibility. Accessibility. These are the abbreviations that software developers use for internationalisation and accessibility, which is ironic because they don't have. help either of those things. And in the time to decipher these, we could have just Google translated the word into a different language. Vivi, it's over to you. Right, this question has been sent in by Ron Nelson. Dr. Ian Wishaw is a professor of neuroscience studying behaviour in rodents. What did he notice about their movement near food that was similar to a flaw in Boris Becker's service action?

I love it when a question just goes off the rails in the last few words. Sorry, give us that again, BB. Dr. Ian Wishaw is a professor of neuroscience studying behaviour in rodents. What did he notice about their movement near food that was similar to a flaw in Boris Becker's service action? Okay, Boris Becker tennis player. That much I know. When you serve in tennis, you throw the ball in the air. and then you strike as it pulls down. Okay, with your...

So the flaws in that could be the way he throws, the way he swings, the way he stands while he does it? Or the noise that he makes as he exhales the air, like a grunt. Or is it more like the way he positions himself? Or maybe he puts too much spin on the ball, and the rodents near food tend to spin round the food. I don't know. Help.

How do they eat? How do rodents eat? VV's looking very excited. Hang on. Hang on. Do they use their tongue and like wrap around the food? VT got something around the tongue, actually. Oh. Surprise. Yes, you guys actually got there really quickly. Something about the tongue. How do they eat? How did they eat their food?

with their tongue. Do they slurp it up? Or do they... Oh, Boris Becker famously, just kind of... As he throws the ball in the air, goes... And pulls it off course.

I mean, like... Tom, I just... Is that actually? Hold that, hold that thought. Like... Okay. Okay. So does the mouse flick... Flick the food

with the tongue in a... in observing... Does he flick the food in the air to catch it? Just, uh, no. I'm thinking of how like a cat laps at milk, like the tongue comes out and flicks back, I think, to kind of pull it up. So maybe, maybe mice do something similar. I assume they just kind of gnawed their way through things. Because you see like mouse bite marks in things.

So maybe back to Boris Becker tennis player. What kind of judgment would the receiving tennis player have to be? make. So we talked about Boris Becker's service action. What judgment would the receiving tennis player have to make? Whether it goes into court or not? Whether he's trying to smash it as hard as possible, whether it's something they could come back to.

Where he's aiming? To do with the placement of the ball, is it going to go to the far corner or, you know, or the inside, or like the middle of the court? The placement of where the ball's going. I think that's, you're on to something there. Boris Becker famously only ever served. the tennis balls in one particular spot, and over the years people got to learn that

and knew that where he was going to place his serve, and that worked to his disadvantage. I don't know. Or he would telegraph where he was going to put it somehow. Like, he had to tell. If he's going to send it to that bit of the court, he's going to do this thing, and his opponent could figure that out.

Oh. So did he make a certain facial expression that kind of gave away where the ball was going to land? Or some body movement, something like that, like Boris Becker had a tell for where he was going to send the ball. That is correct. And now think about the mice as well, right? You guys were talking about the mice and the food.

With the tongue? What? No. With the tiny mouth tongue nibbling at the whatever. What? Is it to do like someone set a mouse trap and the way the mouse will be suspicious of a trap and the way they eat the food, a particular angle, determines whether the trap goes off or not?

Or just they angle the rest of their body to point their tongue in a certain direction? So close. Continue, continue that. Oh, do they point their tongue in a certain direction and it kind of pokes out their cheek? Like that? And that was the direction that they served in.

Boris Becker used to poke his tongue in a cheek depending on which side he was going to play the ball. Bam. Wait, really? I'm going to serve in that direction. It's Boris Becker's. Yes, yes, you guys got it. So Boris Becker would point his tongue to the direction that he served it to. So, yeah, so Dr. Wishaw of University of Lethbridge, Alberta studies how the brain coordinates precise movements.

While researching behavior in rodents, we should actually notice that mice briefly move their tongues in the same direction they were about to reach food as well. Tennis legend, Andrea Agassi reportedly used the same cue to read serves from Boris Becker. When Dr. Wishon noticed that US football player Patrick Mahomes did something similar before passing the ball, he half-jokingly refused to reveal this observation until the Super Bowl had passed. Michael Jordan also famously stuck out his tongue while driving towards the basket. And I've been told that people do this when they play Summer War. So the next time you play on a wall of somebody, make notes of whether you stick her tongue out or not.

Thank you to Anton for this next question. In July 1497, Craftsman Gerhard von Vow dug a roughly conical hole in the central plaza of Erfurt, Germany. He filled it back up some weeks later so that no trace was left. What was the hole for? And one more time, in July 1497, Craftsman Gerhard von Vowel

dug a roughly conical hole in the central plaza of Erfurt, Germany. He filled it back up some weeks later so that no trace was left. What was the hole for? Well, if he filled it back up again, I feel like my mind immediately jumps to hiding something that's precious to him so that no one could find it except for him afterwards. But then you emphasize that it's a conical hole. Roughly, yeah. I want to just give a... comedy answer and say, was he the first person to ever build a sandcastle on a beach and just dug a big hole, you know, and then made a sand castle? In this case, no. Also, I, it says roughly conical

hole. Most holes that are dug are roughly conical. In this case, it's, it's that way for a reason. We don't, we don't know where he was digging the hole. I've gone with sand. In the central plaza of Erfurt, Germany. So plaza indicates paved street, thinks concrete. Was it, the first ever, hang of 1497, there weren't laying gas pipes. I'm trying to, was it the first ever utility pipes? But I don't think they had electricity in 1497. And he's a craftsman, rather than an engineer. Yes. Wait, Sue. Was it sewage? Sorry, no, no. Craftsman, not engineer. VT's right there. It could be a time capsule or just a piece of arts that's, Have you seen those toys where they embed like a dinosaur in a rock or a bunch of concrete?

And you get this little hammer and you hammer that out. So it's the process. That's the art rather than the product. This is more craft than art. I think keying in on craftsman was a good call. Although, and this is, look, I'm giving you a diversion here because this is just a fact I know and have. never been able to make a video about. There is an artwork in Germany called the Vertical Earth Kilometer in the town of Castle, where an artist dug a kilometer long, so a kilometer deep hole,

very thin hole, filled it with a kilometer long set of metal bars. And that's it, that's the artwork. If you go up, you just see the very top of a kilometer long rod that goes straight down. And because that is literally the entire story, that's, I never did a video out of because I'm like, yes, that's the thing on the floor there. Can't show you the rest of it without digging a kilometre down. And do you just not see it? No, you just don't see it. You just go take it on faith that there's a kilometre deep rod, starting just there.

I might have to steal that for a VVTV, actually. I like it. You said craft, thinking crafts, but we don't know. Is it like, does he chisel stone, or is it white woodwork or painting, or we haven't determined what... I wouldn't try and enumerate crafts here. I don't think you'll come up with the craft first, but materials might be a good way to think.

The time between digging it up and filling it back in, did that matter? Oh, yeah, definitely. Okay. And then, okay, also the materials, right? Mm-hmm. And did you mention the time frame? Did you tell us how long...

Yeah, some weeks. Some weeks. Some weeks. Some weeks. Some weeks passed before he went back to fill it? I mean, some other stuff happened as well in there. If he was in Central Plaza, surely it must have been like concrete or... A little early for concrete.

Oh, yeah, it was 14. Yeah, it was 14. I couldn't tell me whether it was paved or just trampled down. But Central Plaza is important. Wood. Was it word? No, no. Central Plaza, that's a place where usually there's a landmark or a statue. Yes, landmark, I think, with the one to go for. I would want to say there's a clock, but probably not. Well, yes, attached to something else there.

A statue? Like a tower? A bell tower? VT. Bell tower is a very important set of words here. You're right, Airford Cathedral is important here. Well, digging into a ground sounds like somebody's grave, but it's roughly conical. A grave for something that's not a person, but something that is also clinically shaped.

Grave is accurate in terms of what's going on, but this is more about creation than death. Planting something. What? Oh, this is a service. Creating the cathedral? Cathedral's already there. The bell.

hours already there. The clock. What else is up that tower? What's in a bell tower? A bell on a bit of rope and you ding the bell? Rope. Yeah. Rope.

No, Jeff. Literally the other part of the sentence. The bell. So you need metal. You need metal to make the bell? You do. Well, yes. Gerhard van Val is a bell founder.

A bell maker. What metal do they make bells out of? I don't know. What would I know that? Copper and steel, maybe? I think it's... I should know this. I've done a video about that.

I think it's bell metal, which is mostly tin, I think. Oh, so are you not right in thinking that we're collecting material for the bell? Nope. You'd find that somewhere else. This is another part of the process of making a bell. A mould. A mould for the bell. And you dig the hole in the ground and then you fill it in and that makes the bell.

Did it do it? Yeah. I'm going to give you that. There's a little bit more to the process. But yes, this was a casting pit for a very large bell. At that time, the massive bell, this was called Gloriosa. It was going to be the largest of its kind. Bells of that scale were cast directly in the ground next to the cathedral.

Brilliant. So they would dig a big conical pit. They would build the mould for the bell inside that pit and then construct a temporary furnace nearby to melt the bronze and the tin. They would then release that into the mould and it has to cool slowly. So rather than doing this off in some forge or foundry far away

and then having to move the very large bell a long way, they simply dig the pit at the cathedral, melt the metal, pour it in, and then they don't have to move the bell as far. That's great. Now, see Spider-Rour. We're faced with a threat. That can be anyone on the biggest screen possible.

You got to come with me. I don't know if you're the real Spider-Man. I promised that I would keep you safe. Fine. Spider-Man, brand-new day. Now playing. VT. Whenever you're ready, it's your question, please.

This question has been sent it by Danny. In 1960, Jack and Don set out on a trip with their vehicle carrying 120,000 liters or 32,000 gallons of gasoline. But after returning from a 22-kilometer or 14-mile round-trip that took over 8 hours, none of the fuel had been burned. Why? I'll give that to you again. In 1960, Jack and Don sets out on a trip with their vehicle carrying 120,000 liters or 32,000 gallons of gasoline. After returning from a 22-kilometer or 14-mile round trip,

that took over eight hours, none of the fuel had been burned. Why? I was so sure this was astronauts. You said 1960, I was like, okay, you said Jack and Don, those are very astronaut names. You're like, vehicle, well, that's going to be a spaceship, 120,000 litres of gasoline? At that point, my brain went, no, you don't, no. And then he said it was like 22 kilometres and it hadn't been burned. It is no astronaut.

No, is it sailing and they ended up using wind power rather than the engine power? I was thinking like the was 120K liters were they just like transporting it and they weren't actually using it with some kind of like e-vehicle that didn't require any gasoline. That's so much gasoline. It's very useful. So the gasoline is definitely useful here. That's like a tanker of gasoline. I'm like, I'm bad at volume calculations because there's like a cubed in there.

I can't tell you if that's like road tanker or ocean tanker levels of gasoline. Wait, Tom, that might be it. They're delivering, they're a delivery tanker and they didn't deliver their thing, so they just came back with their cargo still unused, undelivered. No?

It wasn't a delivery. The gasoline was useful for the vehicle. So the 120k liters of gasoline was helpful, but just not in the 14-mile journey. What other use for gasoline is that? Why do you suddenly need gasoline 11 kilometers away and then not need it anymore? Yeah, and 120,000 liters wouldn't be for a... like a normal journey anyways. So this must have been like a...

A large truck, lorry, ship, not a small car. It must be a large vehicle that requires, under normal circumstances, a lot of fuel. And then circumstances transpired that it didn't require it. Veevi, you said it's not a normal journey. You're right. It was like a rescue mission? Was it something in flight? Was it a plane or helicopter?

Oh. Because you have those mid-air refueling. fuelings, don't you? Ooh, that's good. You say that, Jeff. They don't use up their gasoline. Why did they need to refuel? Yeah.

What year again? 1960 something? That was 1960. Why do I feel like it's like going to one of, like the Arctic or the North Pole or something? It's like an extreme journey. Someone filled a zeppelin with gasoline and... Or maybe it's...

No, you... I was down to think maybe it's a... submarine. Maybe it's going down into the oceans, but you don't want to have 120,000 leaves of gasoline that far underwater. That doesn't feel like a useful thing. You're headed in right direction. What, down? Yeah, downwards. Huh. So it's an exploration submarine on a mission to...

someone help me out. You're right, you're right. It is? What kind of mission is it? Rescue. I'm thinking rescue. Yeah, like a shipwreck, a shipwreck rescue or a... Not quite a rescue. Gasoline is less dense than water, right?

It floats on top of water. Yes. That's very important. Ah, ha, ha. Physics. So could it be a buoyancy thing? It is. I don't know.

how, and I'm hoping someone else can fill that in. So they were trying to salvage something, bringing it to the surface by using gasoline instead of, well, because it's less, yeah, less point. Yeah, because of the density compared to water. But they didn't, the mission, for some reason the mission didn't come to fruition as, as expected. They succeeded in the mission, or in the challenge, but they just weren't there to rescue something. Mariana's trench? Like the deepest point of the ocean? Yes, yeah. To go to the deepest point in the ocean, I think you mentioned, which, which Which point was that? Mariana's Trench, I think the name is? Yes. Yes. Yes, that's it.

They took 120,000 litres of gasoline to the deepest part of the ocean. Yes, but you knew exactly what it's for. It's for buoyancy, right? To get themselves. But how did they submerge themselves in the first place? And then for some scientific reason, they didn't need it. They came to the surface without having to use the gasoline. No, because they don't have to burn it. They just have to be heavier than it on the way down. They can leave the weights at the bottom. They did, yes. I think they offloaded some weights, and then the gasoline helped them, because of its buoyancy, to float back to the surface. Because you can't use air because it's so much pressure. Yes, and with so much pressure, what's going to happen to air?

Might it liquefy that pressure? Or get close to it? It's not going to be useful for buoyancy. It's going to shrink down so much that... That's it. I think they got the full story. Oh, okay. I think we got it. Just for those of us who might still be a little confused here, do you want to give us that as one coherent sentence instead of my occasional ramblings there? So the Trieste is basically this vessel

that can submerge into deep sea, and they were trying to, I think, beat the record of going to the deepest points in the ocean that we know of. So it's basically a deep sea submersible. And gasoline was used for buoyancy. because it is less dense or lighter than water. And so also the main thing is that it's incompressible,

unlike air, which meant it could withstand extreme pressure. So you could take it down to the bottom of the ocean without the gasoline compressing and losing that buoyancy. So it was Jack Pickard and Don Welsh. I said they sound like astronaut names. I was really close. Just the wrong direction. I think they weren't Navy crews.

So, yeah, they conducted the first mission, crude mission to the base of Challenger Deep, and that's the deepest part of the Mariana Trench. There were electric motors that handled the propulsion of the craft, and iron pellets were released from the vessel so that they could control their assets. We arrived, we littered, we left.

You were spot on. One last item on the list then, and that is the question from the very start of the show. Thank you to David Turner for sending this in. Why is Dick Van Dyke not allowed to play with Lego? Anyone want to take a quick punt at that? Who is this guy? Are we meant to know who he is? Oh, no. Jeff, do you want to explain Dick Van Dyke?

He's a sort of... Yes, no? I want to say, it's entertainer, singer, but for many years ago, you know, legendary entertainer. Yeah. Yeah. He honestly, kind of an all-rounder. He could sing, he could dance, he could do very bad cockney accents in Mary Poppins.

He had many TV shows of his own, including the Dick Van Dyck show. The Dick Van Dyke show, yeah. Diagnosis, Murd, like going back many, many years to the black and white days of television. Because Lego is. is in colour. And so Lego didn't want their products, people thinking their products were in black and white was something stupid. No, I have no idea. This isn't just a strict rule. It's more of a guideline. When you said he's a dancer, I was just thinking that he would step on them. If I tell you, the ban began on the 13th of December 2025. I know recently Legos released a few

couple of cool items. Like, they had the smart Lego that came out and like these like new Lego slippers. I don't think it has anything to do. No, and he's not the only one who wouldn't be allowed to play with this. Oh, what kind of traits does he have that prevents him from playing with him? There is a particular trait.

You've kind of alluded to it already. Dancer or a musician? Well, he's been doing this for a long time. He's old. I'm assuming he's no longer alive. Is he alive still? He is. Dick Van Dyke. How is he?

Oh, one to 99. Yes, VT. Carry on. By the way, at time of recording, yes, Dick Van Dyke is still alive. VT, do you want to fill us in? What did you just connect there? Yeah, because on Lego boxes, it says it's... Oh!

If you're aged from 1 to 99, you can play with Lego. But if he turned 100, he's just out of that age, age band. Oh. Dick Van Dyke just turned 100 years old at time of recording. and is still performing from time to time. He was in a Coldplay music video a couple of years ago. He was in Mary Poppin's returns just a few years ago. Yes, Lego, as a guideline, says there for ages 9 to 99 or 4 to 99,

and Dick Van Dyke is 100 years old. Thank you very much to our players. Where can people find you? What are you up to? We will start with VT. It's VT Physics here, and for those of you who've been following me, you'll know that I've started VT's side quest as well, where I vlog daily, so check that out as well.

VV. I'm VVVTV. You can find me on Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok. And Jeff. Yeah, Jeff Marshall, Jeff with a year on YouTube, making sort of railway and transport films and documentaries. And if you want to know more about this show, you can do that at lateralcast.com. We can also send in your own ideas for questions. We are at Lateralcast, basically everywhere, and there are full video episodes every week on Spotify. Thank you very much to Jeff Marshall. Thank you. Bye.

VVTV. Thanks, everyone. VT Physics. Thanks, Tom and everybody. I've been Tom Scott, and that's been Lateral.